Brittney and Ben | Proposal at Notre Dame

How we met, her side:

The story of how we met is a love story straight out of the movies. Movie Theater, that is. Ben and I worked at the same movie theater during high school and college. Things between us began in the box office, where Ben tried to charm me with his quick wit and endless knowledge of useless movie trivia. What started off as witty and flirtatious banter soon evolved into much more. The entire beginning of our relationship can actually be traced back to one fateful conversation in the break room. I had gone bowling with friends the night before, and remarked to Ben that he should have come along. He quickly quipped that he would have loved to go bowling but didn’t have my number. Playing along, I grabbed his phone and put my number on it. We hung out later that week, and the rest as they say, is history.

Funnily enough, we’ve still never gone bowling together…

The Proposal, his side:

The story of our engagement is one of nervousness, rain, and improvisation.

Brittney and I were planning to visit my father in Indiana last September. Before the trip, I pulled her dad aside and had “the talk.” After receiving his blessing, I knew I would have to come up with a creative plan. Brittney had showed me her dream ring, so with help from her dad, I ordered the ring. To keep everything a surprise, her parents picked the ring up from the jeweler the day before we departed for Indiana. That night, I snuck the ring into the bottom of my bag.

Part of our visit to Indiana was to visit my dad’s family in South Bend. While there, we had planned on taking a tour of the University of Notre Dame, which is our favorite college football team. I knew I wanted to pop the question there, as not only do we love the Fighting Irish, but the campus itself is gorgeous. It began to rain as soon as we got there, which left me wondering how the day would turn out.

I knew that Brittney had always dreamed of getting married by the beach, not in a church. With me being Catholic, I figured I would be clever and propose at the altar of Notre Dame’s cathedral, the Basilica. Unfortunately I did not take into account the fact that a famous Catholic church would most likely be host to actual weddings on a Saturday. With no access to the Basilica, me and my plan were left soaking wet.

Luckily both my father and I are quick on our feet and we quickly devised a back up plan. Near the Basilica is a small rocky, cave like structure with hundreds of prayer candles called The Grotto (not to be confused with Hugh Hefner’s grotto). My dad whipped up a story about his time as a forester, and took off in search of a tree he once worked on in the 70s. This left Britt and I alone at the Grotto, where I made my move in the light drizzle.

I had plenty of time to in the previous weeks to devise the perfect, most heart felt speech that adequately summed up my love for Brittney. All of that went out the window as I prepared to drop to one knee. As I nervously clutched the ring box in my pocked I stumbled for the perfect words, the kind of one liner that would melt her heart and reduce her to tears. What I actually came up with was a rambling, incoherent explanation of what my original plan was. I dropped to one knee, trying to avoid any puddles and asked her to spend the rest of her life with me.

Brittney of course said yes, otherwise you wouldn’t be on this site. It may not have gone 100% according to my plan, but to this day I would not change a thing.